Two days ago, it was the junior class’s turn to go on an orienteering trip to a local glen. I come from a fairly small area, and I wish I could describe how lucky we are to have a place like this. It doesn’t really have any strenuous trails, but if you’re willing to walk for a little while you can find some pretty impressive sights of the valley that I live in. I personally have lots of fun memories of this place from the last few summers where other kids and I would swim in places we weren’t really supposed to and hike off of the trails until we were stuck in pricker bushes and couldn’t move without the chance of putting tears in our clothing.

On this trip, we could choose one partner and we’d then be paired with another duo. That group of four would be paired with another, so you had a total of seven other people with you to get lost with and to fend off any bears that might come your way.

Just kidding. Exciting things like fighting bears don’t really happen too often around here. I think the teachers understood this as well because they never gave me the emergency whistle that they promised.

Somebody did fall out of a kayak, though! Kayaking in the resevoir was optional and, since I can’t swim very well and have a slight fear of water, I chose not to participate. Those of us standing around helped our classmates in and out of the kayaks, which were surprisingly heavy for what looked to only be a piece of hollowed out plastic!

My group did get lost a couple of times, but it wasn’t really being lost. The stations that we had to hike to were all rather hard to find and one was way off course! I took it upon myself to feed my group candy and beef jerky so everybody’s mouths (including my own) were too full to complain. It’s funny how it always seems to happen that way. I was hoping my group would be able to put past impressions of each other aside and maybe by the end of the day be comfortable talking with each other. Especially since, you know, we were thrown into the middle of the woods and told to find our way around, but oh well.

At least I can say I would have trusted them to help out if we ran into a bear or two.